


Guardian in Disguise

by violet569



Series: Everybody Knows AU [1]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Everybody Knows AU, Gen, Ghost Portal, I forgot how to tag, Identity Reveal, Ill do this later when I remember, Jazz - Freeform, Jazz knows, Or at least does now, Secret Identity, but not really, no beta we die like men, protective Jazz
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-02 08:48:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18807772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violet569/pseuds/violet569
Summary: Jazz sees herself as Danny's guardian, more so than her parents. She doesn't hold a grudge against them per say, but they definitely don't get any proper parenting points. That being said, it's always been up to her to take care of Danny, grow up too fast and be the older figure he really needed. She's always been so close to him, despite what he may say otherwise, so of course she would figure out what really happened during the portal accident. In fact, she knew almost from day one.Danny didn't have to know that though.





	Guardian in Disguise

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Make It Go Away](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17429702) by [DarkNymfa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkNymfa/pseuds/DarkNymfa). 



> This serious sort of sprung into existence because of DarkNymfa's No One Knows AU and I thought, well, what if the opposite were to happen and everyone knew? If you haven't read their AU yet you should do so! It's wonderfully written and the plot is ensnaring!!

The day after Danny had come up from the lab and declared that the ghost portal was, in fact, working, Jazz knew something was wrong.

 

He usually never went down into the lab if he could help it, for fear that their parents would drag him into a long winded lecture about ghosts and end up making something explode. So him being in the lab itself to begin with was odd, but then again one of Danny's quirks, she'd noted, was being a little odd. Sam and Tucker had followed him out of the lab shortly after, so she figured that whatever he wasn't saying they knew already. She hadn't the faintest idea of what happened, or rather she didn't really want to imagine what had caused him to look as pale as a ghost when he'd stepped out of the basement. Hopefully his friends would help because lord knows he would never come to Jazz for anything, even if she could help.

 

She sighed after rereading the same page in her book for the fifth time. Closing her psychology book after marking her page, she sunk into the soft cushions of the couch. She was actually really worried for Danny. He was a teenage boy with fluctuating hormones and an unusual family life. There was bound to be an abundance of issues. Usually he dealt with his problems alright, not great but decent, but when it came to their parents he never handled it well. Speaking of parents…

 

Her eyes darted over to the door of the lab, a light glow emanating from beneath the door where her parents usually worked. They were out at the moment, actually getting groceries together for a change after Jazz had insisted. They hadn't wanted to leave the newly opened ghost portal without doing any tests, but had conceded once she'd pointed out that they all would take a one way trip to the Ghost Zone (as they'd dubbed it) if none of them had any food to eat. Maddie relented and began heading to the store, and it only took a little push about buying fudge to get Jack to go with her.

 

Jazz took a moment to wonder about the ghost portal they'd created. She was no ectobiologist by any stretch of the imagination, nor a scientist or inventor, so she really couldn't provide much fact on the matter, but then again neither was Danny. Was his current frantic evasiveness tied to the portal? It was possible. That was their parents’ work of over ten years. They'd had all that time to plan and it hadn't worked for them, but Danny, who hadn't been interested in ghosts for years, suddenly went down into the lab and returned with it working?

 

That question opened a fresh can of worms that threaded their way through her brain.

 

If it was the portal was the source of his current demeanor, then what actually happened in the lab? Now Jazz wished she'd pushed a little harder in advocation of putting cameras in the lab. Maddie and Jack hadn't wanted any permanent surveillance, only portable cameras, because they hadn't wanted any outside equipment interfering with their inventions. Well, if she couldn't find out through video, she could technically just ask him.

 

She internally scoffed at that thought. Danny? Open up? To _her_? That was laughable. She could just continue to speculate, but that would wear her brain out faster than her dad goes through fudge. It would be useless without seeing that portal for herself. That's it! She could just go down stairs while her parents weren't home and no one would be the wiser.

 

Grinning to herself, she set her book down softly on the side table and stood up as nonchalantly as she could. She was pretty sure Danny was out with Sam and Tucker, but sometimes it was like he just appeared upstairs without anyone having heard him come in. He had always been good at the act of disappearing and reappearing. She just hoped he didn't “appear” home while she was in the lab. Not like he would tell, but she would never live it down.

 

In a casual manner, she walked to the lab door and slipped inside, closing it with a soft click behind her. The lab had no lights on, but there wasn't really any need, not with the eerie green glow from the portal illuminating the room. The center of the portal spun around, twisting and turning in on itself, churning like a thick whirlpool just waiting to pull in an unsuspecting victim. If there was one word she would use to describe the machine, it would be foreboding.

 

She turned the lights on anyways.

 

The tables were laden with unfinished projects, faulty wiring and a glowing substance in beakers that Jazz was not going to think about. She hadn't been down here but a few scant times, so she didn't have anything to compare it to when looking for clues to see what was different. She did, however, know the difference between her mom's work and her dad's mess. Anything that didn't fit into both of those categories meant that Danny had messed with it.

 

She scanned the room. Pretty much all of it was in disarray, courtesy of Jack's messy habits. The mess was contained in sections though, organized into relevant piles of chaos, no doubt due to Maddie's more cleanly habits. The only thing that didn't quite fit was the wires around the portal. They looked… not quite in disarray, but like they had been organized and then accidentally disrupted. Like someone had stepped on or tripped over them. She frowned. Jack and Maddie may have not have had the best lab habits, but they were rarely careless enough to step on equipment, especially something important enough to them as the portal.

 

Jazz wanted to talk a closer look, but wasn't sure if she would be affected by whatever was causing the portal to glow that brightly. Her parents basically lived in their hazmat suits, she they would have no idea. Maybe she should just grab a hazmat suit and put it on just in case. She walked to the closet that held the hazmat suits and opened it. There were a multitude of suits for both her parents, predictably. She would have to borrow one of Maddie's because she most definitely didn't fit into a hazmat suit that was tailored to her seven year old self.

 

She blinked. That was weird, Danny's hazmat suit wasn't hanging in its labeled spot. She did a quick search of the closet, making sure that it hadn't fallen off the rack before concluding that it just wasn't there. Had Danny taken it at some point or had their parents? She decided to think on it later as she grabbed one of Maddie's suits and slipped it on, thankful that she wasn't too different from her mom's size.

 

With cautious steps, Jazz walked closer to the swirling portal. It was almost mesmerizing with the way the light rippled and surface changed, rolling over into itself. Enchanting, maybe. It might even have been beautiful if it wasn't a supposed portal to the land of the dead.

 

That's when it struck her. The wires in front and around the portal distributed, Danny's missing hazmat suit, his near traumatized look after exiting the basement with Sam and Tucker more silent than she'd even seen them following behind.

 

Danny had been the one to fix it, and something had happened to scare him. Badly.

 

If he could have figured it out with little to no knowledge of ecto-tech and ghosts besides what their parents had shoved down their throats, then so could she.

 

She needed to know what happened to her brother.

 

With renewed determination, she surged forward, looking for the off button. When she found none, she resorted to unplugging the portal, and watched as the luminous green substance vanished along with the light it provided. She examined the exterior first. Nothing seemed like it was any different than when their parents had dragged them into the lab to see it the first time. The rim was clean, spotless even. No, wait. What were those black marks that stretched inside?

 

Jazz pulled off her gloved and brushed her hand over the slightly blackened metal around the edge. It was rough to the touch, and felt almost fresh. She pulled back her fingers and there was something like black powder stuck to them. It reminded her of a lighting scorch mark. She put the glove back on, peering into the dark portal chamber. But lightning? Here? There way electricity sure, but not nearly enough to make the inside of the portal look like it was hit by a miniature thunderstorm.

 

...Or was there?

 

It was possible that the lightning didn't originate from the lab at all. I could have been from the Ghost Zone. It was a new frontier after all, and no one knew anything about it other than that it housed ghosts. There was a part of her that itched to tell her parents, give them more information on the Ghost Zone, but she shut that thought down quickly. She had a feeling that this freak lighting occurrence was related to Danny and didn't want to risk betraying him for science.

 

That, however, didn't mean Jazz wouldn't take a closer look. The faint charring on the rim wasn't enough to tell much about what happened. She had to go inside. She hesitantly stepped inside before pausing. One second. Two. Three. Nothing happened, so she took a few more steps, glancing around the internal walls. They were nearly blackened by the sheer amount of scorch marks decorating them. Something had definitely happened here, and there was little doubt in her head that Danny had something to do with it now. What was it though?

 

Then she tripped.

 

With a small shriek, she stumbled and managed to catch herself against the wall before toppling to the ground. She felt something click beneath the hand on the wall and quickly pulled her hand back as if that would undo whatever it was she did. There was silence. Not whirring of gears or buzzing of something power up. She glanced to the wall to see what she had pressed. Was… was that the On button?

 

She pressed the popped out button, it clicked back in and—yep. That was the On switch. A push to turn on, push again to turn off button.  Why would that be inside though? She'd have to check the blueprints to be sure.

 

Jazz looked at the floor behind her to see why she'd tripped. It was those same wires from before. She'd been so busy looking around her that she hadn't noticed the cables on the floor that snaked in from the outside the portal. She couldn't help but think that it would have been bad if she had tripped like that and hit the button while the portal had still been… plugged… in.

 

No way.

 

Eyes wide with disbelief, she darted out to check that the portal wasn't plugged in. She had unplugged it before entering, as was the naturally safe thing to do, but _what if Danny hadn't?_ He's known for being a little careless, so she wouldn't put it past him to have missed it entirely. He's known to try and impress Sam and Tucker, even with things he knows nothing about. He's known for being clumsy, so if he'd gone inside there he'd have done exactly what she just did. Gone in, looked around distractedly, tripped, and _pressed the button_.

 

Oh god.

 

 _Oh god oh god oh god_ —

 

No wonder his hazmat suit was missing. He'd used it. No wonder he hadn't said anything. He'd been worried what they'd do. No wonder he looked scared out of his wits when he left the lab.

 

He'd been electrocuted.

 

She had no real proof. She wasn't a detective and she knew so little about electricity and its effects, but the clues we're adding up, and she didn't like the picture they were forming.

 

But the baseline was: Danny had been hurt one way or another and he hadn't said anything to anyone besides Sam and Tucker who had most likely witnessed it.

 

Jazz stumbled as she made sure the button had been pressed in within the portal before plugging it in. She felt sick to her stomach as the sickly green substance spun back to form the portal just as she'd found it. She couldn't see straight as she pulled the hazmat suit off her as quickly as possible and draping it across her shoulder. She'd wash it and put it back later. Maddie wouldn't even notice. Not now though. Now she had to find those blueprints. That portal had done something to Danny besides hurting him, and she needed to figure out what it was.

 

Her hands trembled as she searched through the papers, drawers, and cabinet's on autopilot. Her little brother had been hurt but said nothing, and that stung, but he was more important than a few hurt feelings. He needed help. _She_ could help him, but not if she didn't know the cause. So she fought through the building tears blurring her sight and through the constricting of her chest in favor of focusing on finding the blueprints.

 

Her shaking hands didn't make the task easier, but she eventually pulled out the sketches and measurements for the portal. She ran her finger over the papers, looking for the plans for the power button. She huffed as she found it. The original plan was to put the on/off button on the outside near the plug, but next to it in her dad's messy handwriting read, “ _Too complicated! Put it somewhere else!”_ Of course it didn't say where else it was supposed to go, but it ultimately ended up on the inside without Maddie knowing. No wonder it hadn't worked when they first plugged it in. The button hadn't been pressed yet.

 

After a more thorough search, she found the detail and notes about the portal during building phase. Her face paled the farther down the page she got. The portal was designed to forcefully rip a hole into the Ghost Zone. They were unsure what the reaction would be, so the portal also acts as a temporary containment device to stop any unwanted side effects escaping the portal. There were theories on the reaction scribbled in the margin:

 

_Gas?_

_Poisonous? Paralytic? Sleep inducing? Irritant?_

_Explosion?_

_Light? Sound? Both? Damaging? All?_

_Energy?_

 

Jazz noted with distaste that none of the predicted reactions could have been neutral or non harmful. Granted, they were right and it had been a negative reaction if she was reading correctly, but their lack of optimism was astounding. She still didn't believe in ghosts, but there was no doubt that they had created a portal linking the lab and somewhere else. If there were sentient creatures on the other side, it would not be beneficial to assume the worst. Prepare for it maybe, but not assume.

 

She then went as white a sheet. The portal was supposed to be the convergence of the two locations. The mix, the blend of the known world and whatever was on the other side, _and Danny had been standing in it_.

 

Oh god, if their parents knew he had been exposed to the Ghost Zone… She didn't even want to think about it. She knew Jack and Maddie cared for them, but based on her notes of her parents, that care would stop short once Danny became more valuable as research than as a child, as a son. She couldn't predict what would happen in the future, but with their current mindset especially with they newly opened portal, her little brother would become no more than an experiment, a test in their eyes. She couldn't tell them a thing.

 

Jazz went to place all the papers back were she found them, but paused, hands still shaking with minor tremors. What if the portal research just… disappeared? Their parents still have the portal, but they'd need to come up with all new theories. That just might be what they need. She steeled her resolve. Now or never.

 

In a swift motion, she rolled all the papers containing information about the portal into a cylinder and tucked it under her arm. She rearranged the lab just like how it was before she'd stepped in, minus the portal papers, and darted out of the room as if the floor beneath her heels was on fire. She booked it up the stairs as fast as she could and slammed the door shut to her room once she was inside. Grabbing an empty folder, she quickly labeled it as “D/P” for Danny/Portal and stuffed it in the bottom of her draw where it would hopefully never see the light of day. She wouldn't destroy it, for fear that it could hold clues on how to how she could help Danny, but she refused to let their parents find it either.

 

Jazz let out a shuddering breath and slumped to the ground, the weight of her findings resting heavily on her shoulders. Their parents couldn't know what she knew, that was for certain, but should she tell Danny she knew? His mind was no doubt in a fragile state, so she had to tread carefully. She wanted to help him through what he was going through, but… He already had help, didn't he? Sam and Tucker, although probably not the best sources for information, were the closest to Danny, and they already knew about what happened. It pained her to say, but they were probably exactly the kind of help he needed right now. Not someone who he thought was an overbearing and protective sister and would likely to tell their parents about him. It didn't matter if she wouldn't, but he didn't know that and would most likely not believe it if she told him.

 

He would have to tell her on his own time, she decided. He doesn't trust her with that information, not yet, so she would wait until he did. It was unlikely that he would know what's happening to him, so he'll need time to figure it out, and when he needs help, his friends will be there for him. She'll be there too, but he didn't have to know that yet.

 

After triple checking that the documents were safely tucked away to where only she could find them, she opened her door and trotted down the stairs to grab and finish her book. Her mind and worries had been subdued so she was hoping she could focus on her psych book now. They weren't gone by a long shot, but she had a temporary solution. She would be his protector while he was home. Whenever their parents got even remotely close to finding it out, she would throw them off the scent. If he needed help, she would assist in any way she could. She would be someone protecting him while he didn't even know it.

 

When a letter had come home from the school saying that Danny was forbidden from touching lab equipment, she'd defended him.

 

When his grades started slipping and absences began piling up, she'd started teaching and making excuses for him.

 

When a boy ghost appeared around Amity and began fighting other hostile ghosts, she'd known immediately.

 

Jazz smiled as she glanced out the window, spotting Danny wearing the largest genuine smile she'd seen in some time while walking with Sam and Tucker, she knew she'd made the right call.

 

She was his protector, his helper, his guardian in disguise.


End file.
